Jumping right into this theme on care, I left off with a question in the last episode. That being to write down a number from 1-10 on how you are doing overall. If you have not done so, write down that number. Today we are going to explore this further in figuring out where you are and how this may be affecting your personal finances. I have found that this little test has been really helpful in the relationships in my life, in improving both accountability and care for myself and others.

Part of building sustainable financial margin in your life is making sure that you cover your bases in regards to proper care. In this theme, we are going to cover mechanisms and habits that you need to put into place in order to lead a life that allows you to enjoy the journey in becoming your best for those in your life and what it is that have set out to accomplish. Let’s get back to defining where our focus should be daily so that we don’t wait until we burnout in order to get rest, we don’t jump from vacation to vacation in order to enjoy life, and we don’t purchase more and

more things to then be obligated to leaving us less and less time to be involved in what really matters to us.

There are so many aspects to our lives that seem like we couldn’t live without, but honestly looking at what your baseline needs are and how much of your life is being governed by non-essentials will help you to know what needs to be added and probably more importantly stripped away. The purpose of going through a theme on what is essential to you, is for you to seriously look at your basic needs as well as your basic wants that feed into the life you want to lead. Only you can define what it is that is essential to your life.

Some people know what they wanted to do for a living from a very early age, and others follow in the footsteps of those who inspired or influenced them most, while there are still others who either followed a certain track because of prestige or money, or are still figuring out what they want to do when they grow up. It’s tough to build a life in a certain direction, to then realize that you have to change course. If you already reviewed what’s most important to you, you probably have a good idea as to whether you are where you want to be in life.

Looking over the essentials you’ve outlined by category, the next step is to build them into a budget or Plan to Spend. The purpose of a budget is to tell your money what the priorities are, versus wondering what your money was spent on after the fact. Once you have looked at these 11 steps to developing a budget and immediately factored in your specific essentials in each category, you’ll then be able to see what are the categories that you place the greatest focus or importance on. This will ensure that the money that flows through your hands goes to the areas that are most important to you.

Looking at this theme on what’s essential, it’s important to take a step back and look at a holistic approach of the categories we looked at, as this will help you merge these categories in order to have a broad understanding of your expenses. Pulling from what is essential in your housing, transportation, clothing and the like, gather what is actually essential to your lifestyle above the bare essentials like food, water, and sleep. Pulling this together will provide you with a base-line to start with.

Let me make sure to state that the most important aspect is to be insured! Uninsured or underinsured in your health insurance is the leading cause of bankruptcy, so making sure that you have a policy in place is especially important. If you're unsure where to start, get insured in these three categories: health insurance, dental insurance, and vision insurance.

You may have heard it said that if you don’t have your health, you don’t have anything. Now that may be a stretch, but I would agree that you can’t fully enjoy all of the other aspects of life if your health is not intact. If you or a loved one has ever dealt with a significant health issue, you may see the truth in that. So think about it, what is it that is essential to your lifestyle for your ability to maintain the proper body composition, energy, and overall health?

There is a subscription model for just about everything now and it causes so many people to have ghost expenses that fly under the radar because they are not handing over the cash or swiping the card. Take a look at what you’re opted-in for and determine what truly adds value and what needs to go.

Think about your core circle of people for a minute. This is not only your family and friends, but also those that you are connected to outside of this group. The more generous you are with your time, talent, and resources, ultimately the more opportunity you will have and the less you will focus on yourself and your own needs.